The Family Business (R,L,T)

Richard stepped through the doorway and was no longer in the auditorium. As he looked around he saw the red and gold carpets and mahogany doors of the estate back home. Genet had copied the same hallway for the waiting area in the last challenge for anyone that’d been captured.

Luna was waiting at the landing for him, seated at a table. It had a burgundy tablecloth on it, and a slightly lighter red bottle of perfume resting on top of it.

Is she? He had a suspicion what she was doing with her eyes closed, but… She wouldn’t do it right in front of me, right? “Hey," he softly said.

She opened her eyes, but still seemed distracted. He could still see her left hand moving under the table. “Hey.”

“Are you… alright?”

“Yeah, I’m-” she made a noise. “-I’m fine. I need you to spray yourself with that.” She asked, referring to the perfume.

“Is that what caused… your current issue? Are the others alright?”

“The others are fine, Dick” It came out as a hiss towards the end. “Sorry. Didn’t mean for it to sound like that. Even Maeve and Hel are good, since I know you’re going to ask. I’m just a bit-” She made another small noise. “-pent up from Touch Base after five scenes and whatever you did on the beach yesterday.”

“Oh. Shit, I’m sorry.”

Luna closed her eyes again “Don’t worry. Just use the perfume. Hel’s waiting for you down the hall.”

Richard hesitantly picked up the bottle and sprayed his neck. It smelled like Hazel. He set it back down and proceeded down the hall.

He was used to the mansion. Its red and gold color scheme mixed heavily with dark wood was home, even as comfortable as he’d become in DC. Every piece of art he passed on the wall he remembered being brought home.

He reached the end of the hall, which should’ve led into the parlor. It was where they held more personal events like Christmas.

But instead he stared at the door to Hazel’s briefing room. It’s not that he was forbidden from going inside, just… highly discouraged. Hel always kept the door locked, and Hazel had pointedly changed the subject whenever he’d asked about it until he’d understood that it and the rest of Hazel’s working quarters in the manor were best left ignored.

But it stood in front of him now, waiting for him to go inside. He twisted the knob and stopped wasting time.

The room looked much more modern than the rest of the mansion. Most of the walls were covered with blinking screens, and a large wooden table occupied most of the room.

Hel was waiting for him, sitting on the table. She was wearing her collar as had become usual for her, with a tight red dress that stood out well against the cream of the wall behind her. She had little hoop earrings like she used to wear for confidence. He hadn't seen her wear that sort of outfit in an astonishingly long time. She used to use it for galas or shows, but nowadays she of course stuck to her suits.

“May I stand so we can talk?” She asked.

“Go ahead.”

She nodded to thank him, and revealed several manilla folders that she’d hidden behind her on the table.”I thought we could talk about what we could do after the show.”

“Like what?”

His stepsister handed him the file sitting on top. It read Gwendolyn Byres.

He opened the file. It opened with a table of contents like Hazel’s had, though there were fewer chapters. It mentioned a childhood in Scotland he skimmed past. He paid slightly more attention to a chapter on her attendance at the Reynolds school in London. He knew that Hel recruited some of her models there. Gwendolyn did well enough at Reynolds to be invited to the States.

The next chapter detailed her move to New York and her employment contract. It looked fine, he didn’t linger on the legalese since he wasn’t an expert in employment law and only had thirty minutes anyways.

The final chapter was Gwendolyn’s portfolio. He’d read that she was a model. He saw here that she was as beautiful as he’d expect. She had emerald green eyes and orange-red hair like fire. She was nearly as thin as Aubrey, and her smile shined like the sun.

What felt odd were the bookmarks Hel had left in this section. They were focused on lingerie and swimsuit shoots that Gwen had done. He flipped from beach to beach, growing increasingly confused. Why is she showing me this? He closed the file.

“What do you think of her?” Hel asked cheerfully.

“She’s pretty, I suppose. She seems good at her job. Why did you-”

She interrupted him with another file. He turned red seeing it. Jessica Fairlane.

He’d had a crush on her as a teenager. Who hadn’t? He tried to justify to himself. The actress had been in several blockbusters when he was much younger. How does Hel know about this? He skimmed through, spending less time on this one since he already knew so much about her. Cretaceous World, The Helix, one of the old Scorpion-Man movies. He knew her filmography embarrassingly well.

He stumbled across one more line that surprised him. She was the voice actress for Mrs.Implausible? That felt like it should mean something, but the pieces weren’t coming together.

Hoping whatever he was missing would click later, he tossed the folder onto the table. “Why did you show me these?”

Helena was still smiling. “Before I answer that, can you read one more for me?” She handed him a third file.

He looked at it, even more confused, since he knew the name again. Beth Holbrook.

Beth was one of Hel’s favorite employees. She had been mentioned briefly a hundred times in reference to projects his stepsister was considering. Any time she wanted someone to check her projections before an official pitch, she’d go to Beth. She’d tried promoting the woman, but from what he’d heard she was nearly as shy as Stella.

He skimmed through again. Everything looked as he expected. He still didn’t understand why Hel was showing him this. He skipped to the pages she’d bookmarked hoping it’d make sense.

It told a story about her volunteering with her local animal shelter, including pictures from her Winstagram page of a one-eyed dog in her lap. He flipped to another, and it was a blog post she’d written about her local food bank looking for more rice donations. He found a third, and it was another Winstagram post reminding people to vote. She’s practically a saint. I wonder if this is why Hel relies on her so much.

Richard set down Beth’s file with the others, a churning sense of guilt in his stomach at having peeked into the personal lives of three women he barely knew. He looked at his stepsister, still looking calm and self-satisfied.

“I still don’t understand why you made me read those. What do they have to do with what happens after the show?”

“Well,” she began to explain as if it was the most obvious thing in the world, “Once Genet was done with us I thought we could approach them to join as well.”

“Why?”

“Why not? I hadn’t realized you were so interested in collecting a harem before, but now that I know, who says we have to stop?”

“Isn’t- I don’t know whether to say four or seven, but isn’t that enough?”

“Who says it has to be? You did say you thought Gwen was pretty, and I remember your old crush.”

Richard stared at his stepsister. “Don’t you think that’s selfish?”

“So? We’re the Turners. Why can’t we take what we want?”

Everything about this feels wrong. “What about Beth?”

“What about her?”

He couldn’t take it anymore. “Hel, what in God’s name is wrong with you?”

She grew solemn. “What’s really the difference between them and everyone else here you’re already entangled with?”

Her master sputtered. “What’s not different? We weren’t the ones that took everyone here. We couldn’t opt out or let anyone leave, though I thought you knew that if I could let you and Dr.Petrov and Ava leave I could. We don’t take people.”

He built to a roar. “Beyond that, I don’t know any of these people. I don’t. Everyone here I’ve already known for years. I care about and love them all, whether as a friend, mentor, or something more. It’s not something that can be replicated with someone from a file, and I thought you would know that I wouldn’t want to. Christ, I thought you wouldn’t want to either.” His last sentence was quieter, tinged with frustration and disappointment.

Her cheerful mask fell as she began to cry. He felt a duty to comfort her clashing with his frustration, and a tide of guilt at holding back.

But her next words froze the churning feelings in confusion. “Thank you. I needed to hear you say that.”

“What?”

“I… how quickly everything has changed and how easily you’ve accepted it has been making me nervous. After everything I heard you do earlier in the challenge like I got more and more unnerved. You were so much more… loud than I imagined you as and with your roleplay… it was better than I guess I expected because you didn’t sound like you were just playing a part sometimes. I wanted to use the time we wouldn’t need to remember to make sure you still had lines. I’m sorry, I know I shouldn’t have done that but something in the back of my mind wanted me to make sure that… that you were still more like Maria’s side of the family.”

“Christ. Hel, sit down” He sat down on top of the table, and a moment later she sat down next to him. “I’m really trying hard not to be angry right now, but this hurts. The test itself, and that you made me think for a moment that’s what you really thought of me.”

“I’m sorry.”

“I know. God, we really should’ve gotten you into therapy years ago.”

She made a nosie of consternation.

“Between this and how many files you have, you can’t keep telling me you’re fine. Why do you have those files anyway?”

Her voice was strained. “I do them for anyone I meet more than once, or anyone that seems like they could be important later.”

“Beth,” he pivoted. “Hers was incredibly detailed, what with how many social media posts you included from her. Is that… normal, for people you know?”

“No.”

“Why-”

“If Aubrey ever lost interest in you, I would have tried introducing you to Beth. I would’ve kept working on Aubrey either way. But I thought Beth deserved someone like you.”

Richard sighed, getting up from the table to pace. “I’m almost glad I won’t remember this. Especially since I’ll have un-spied on her and the others.”

“I’m sorry.”

He decided to just change the subject. “Speaking of files, how many of the files on people here have you shown?”

“Not including Hazel, three out of six. Hazel and I had an argument about them and Maeve let us wait a few days as long as Hazel decides on another one soon.”

“Good. I don’t know what’s in those and I don’t want to know, but you really need to be more honest.”

“I want to try.” Her voice came quietly again.

“Good.” He was thinking back to something else she’d mentioned. “You said you heard me earlier in the challenge?”

She nodded. “Genet had a theater set up for anyone that hadn’t gone yet to see what was currently happening.”

“So you saw-”

“No.” She cut him off. “I didn’t let myself see anything. I just stared at the wall and listened to everything. Hazel watched most of it next to me. Ava was there for the first couple. Felicia came in for the first half of Stella’s, then left to get changed. But I didn’t see anything. I’m sorry.”

“You don’t need to apologize for that.”

“I’m not. I’m just sorry.” She started to cry again.

“Hey, hey.” He stood in front of her. “You wouldn’t do something like that again, right?”

She frantically shook her head.

“I won’t remember this in an hour when we’re back in the auditorium. I won’t know there’s anything for me to be mad about.” It didn’t really seem to help. “And there’s one more thing I’d like to ask to help this version of me forgive you.”

The tears slowed. “What’s that?”

“You have those files outside this room too, right.”

“Yes.”

“Take them down to the beach and just throw them in the ocean. All the files here other than the ones you need to present, you dump and forget that they existed like I’m going to in a few minutes.”

“And you’ll forgive me?”

“The me that remembers that there’s something to forgive would.”

“Deal.”

“Good.”

There was a pause, as all the jumbled feelings began to settle.

“I wish I was as good a person as you.”

“You’re not a bad person, Hel.”

She shrugged. "I'm the kind of person that does this."

“Hey, Hazel’s still watching this, right?” Seeing her nod at him pointing it out, he continued. “What do you think she’d do about you talking about her girlfriend like that?”

A laugh managed to break through. “You’re seriously threatening me with Hazel?”

“Maybe I am.”

They fell to silence again for a moment.

“Can you tell me what you like about everyone in that something more category you said earlier?” She asked.

He nodded. “The four of-”

“-four?”

“Stella confessed yesterday.” His face burned.

“I see. Go ahead then.”

“All four of them are smarter than me in some way or another. Aubrey at her languages, understanding ten when l struggled with Spanish and Latin by themselves. Felicia can plan circles around me when she wants to, and Hazel feels like she comes from a world so much bigger than me. Stella knows so much more about cooking than I thought was possible before I met her, but she’s never talked down to me like she’s had reason to too many times."

He tried to think about what else the four had in common. “She and Aubrey are incredibly sweet. I feel like I’m going to melt sometimes around them, when I don’t feel like I want to protect them. Their instincts when they’re upset are almost the opposite which is kind of confusing, but… I want to be what they need.

“Everyone but Stella is able to firmly tell me what they want, which I appreciate. Stell’s working on it though, and both knowing that she’s trying and knowing that I’m an easier person for her to be around is gratifying.

“Felicia and Hazel-” He ignored the noise he heard at the two women being compared. “They’re both incredibly protective of the people they care about. They’re fighters, and they want something that they don’t necessarily look like they do at first glance. I find it admirable how they fight for us or Ava, and I enjoy when they push back against me. Even though they have very different styles of doing so.

“Does that make sense?”

“You like them because they’re kind, assertive, protective, and better than you at something?” She tried to confirm.

“Yeah, I suppose so.”

She checked the time on her phone. “I’m sorry, again.”

“I know.”

“Before this ends, can I have a hug?”

“Of course.”

She got up from the table to hold him. It was tight the way she wrapped herself around him, unsure of both whether she’d be forgiven and whether she should be. She buried her face in his shoulder, trying not to cry again. He could feel the metal loop of her collar against his chest. He thought he heard her say something.

“What was that?” He asked.

“Hm?”

“I thought I heard you say something just now. But it was too muffled. Can you repeat it?”

“I love-”

The room faded around them.

***

In the void left behind, a slow laugh roiled like thunder. “Interesting. There might be more to her than I thought.” A crack of lightning spat as he made a decision. “But I can test what sticks when things matter.”